Going from the CIA to coaching high school baseball might sound like a unique journey, but it was a decision driven by passion and intuition for Coach Mark “Pudge” Gjormand.
It has paid off in droves for the longtime high school baseball coach of James Madison HS in Virginia. He has has established them as a perennial powerhouse over his 27 season at the helm – including state championships in 2002 (undefeated), 2015 and 2021. He was named the Conference Coach of the Year seven times and Region Coach of the Year four times and he has more than 400 career wins.
But aside from the success on the field, Gjormand has also had a tremendous impact in his business ventures – MVP Baseball and MVP International.
“I realized pretty quickly that high school coaches don’t get paid too well,” said Gjormand. He first realized that his baseball and business knowledge could be used as an avenue to make a career while watching Alex Rodriguez’s press conference with the Texas Rangers in 2001. “I started realizing the world was changing and that you could make money in this.” It began in 2002, after his team ran the table, finishing 29-0 and capturing a Virginia State Title. He bought a nearby building in which a baseball academy had gone out of business. MVP Baseball was created, and has since exploded beyond what he could have imagined. He noted that he was probably around 40 years old when he started pushing to grow the business and now they have 40 teams that train in the facility.
He credits much of the success to people he has met along the way that he has learned from both in terms of coaching and the business side. Another turning point was in 2008. While attending a coaches conference, he was asked about representing Team USA and coaching in Germany.
“Honestly at first I said no, but when I got home I told my wife and she said ‘are you crazy? I think you need to re-think this, so I called him back and said, ‘look if I’m going to do this, I want to put the team together. I want to do this right. If you’re putting USA on the jersey, it’s a pretty big deal to me,” he added.
It wound up being a tremendous success as Coach Pudge put together a loaded roster from northern Virginia of players that included 13 future college players. They went undefeated while playing in places like Munich and representing the country.
“While I was there it kind of just dawned on me, wow I’m coaching baseball in Germany,” he said and added that it was an incredible time.
He wound up coaching in the Dominican Republic the following year and Italy the year after that. They went undefeated on both of those trips again – and he stated it was the first time a visiting team accomplished that in the Dominican Republic.
Inspired by the success, he chose to add this as an extension of MVP Baseball.
It took two years of prepping, but in 2013 MVP International launched, focusing more on the family aspects of the trip as opposed to simply baseball. The decision gained traction as the company grew to 28 employees including 18 full-time workers. He noted that 2019 was a record year for the company as they expanded into other sports such as hockey, softball, lacrosse, basketball and dancing.
Of course, this is precisely the type of company that took a hit during the pandemic. Gjormand mentioned that they had to cancel of their European trips, but they were fortunate that they did not have to lay off any of their full-time employees.
One of those employees, Eli Facenda, is a perfect example of the spirit of the company.
Facenda, a 2011 graduate of James Madison, that played for Gjormand has known him since he was 10-years-old, when he began taking hitting lessons at his facility. Later, he went on to study finance and play Division-I baseball at Lehigh University.
Fast forward to 2015 and Facenda winds up being the first full-time employee of MVP International. “I basically had a choice of going to entrepreneurial route in sports or take a corporate job and I’m not much of a corporate person,” he added.
As the first full-time employee, naturally he had plenty of responsibility.
“I basically did a little bit of everything – from administration work to the day-to-day work.” Over time, his job evolved and he stated he is now in charge of their enrollment team which is essentially marketing/sales.
Facenda took a huge risk in diving head-first into the company. He even took a 3-week long trip in Europe to meet with different sports contacts to build business relationships. Now, he is moving to Austin, TX as they continue to expand. They did an admirable job of staying afloat during the pandemic and now they are on the other side of that.
This season, they pivoted to hosting domestic trips and sent 100+ players to Charleston, SC for a spring training trip. They also sent two teams to Hawaii and a softball team to Puerto Rico. They are anticipating 2022 to be a huge year with 50-60 trips already in the works.
Axcess Baseball will likely be covering one of the trips. There are preliminary plans to head to Puerto Rico during the February break with a team from Long Island coached by some highly-regarded coaches.
When asked about the experience of playing overseas, Coach Pudge did not hesitate.
“You can go to Georgia or Hoover to go to showcases – and we do have teams that do that – but going overseas is by far the best experience. It helps kids grow up, you get to see how other people live. As big as baseball is, you see the whole world and baseball becomes such a small part of it. Each country has their own thing – but getting to see the Vatican in Italy, or going to see the concentration camps in Germany and then hike in Munich – we are making memories that last lifetime.
“There’s such a small window to travel with your kids – once they get to college they don’t always want to do that anymore, it’s such a great thing for them. You learn to grow up – there’s so many pluses. But seeing the world through athletics is a wonderful opportunity. And when we go, we sign autographs for kids – they get treated like the Yankees.”
In terms of which trips are the most popular, Facenda stated there are three – Italy for the cultural experience, Dominican Republic for the baseball-centric experience and Japan for the most unique and unforgettable experience.
He is personally in charge of creating the trips, designing the itineraries and stated that it’s a great fit for him as a former collegiate baseball player with a passion for traveling. He has sent thousands of travelers to 40+ countries and he’s been to 36 countries over the past six years which allows him to have an intimate knowledge of the trips he’s organizing.
To check them out and find out more about these incredible experiences, you can visit their website by clicking here.
